Residents are encouraged to give their views about Rendall and Rittner’s management at Chelsea Bridge Wharf.

Here is my submission to this consultation:

”Any major capital expenditure (whatever definition one wants to use for that – say works totalling more than £50 per household) should require a majority of residents to support it. The current situation, as I understand it, is that for major works to be approved, only a majority of those voting is required. This means that major works can go through which may not be wanted or needed and only have the support of a tiny proportion of residents. e.g. managing agents may consult about major works in a development that has 1,000 flats. Only 20% (200) may respond to a consultation and if 51% of those approve it then that is sufficient. But that is just 102 households, just over 10% of the total households.

This happened at the development where I live (Chelsea Bridge Wharf). The head of the residents’ association, Mr Charlie Garton Jones, who also runs an estate agency on the development, wished to improve the security to the underground garage doors and entry system. There was absolutely no need for the replacement to the doors as there has been virtually zero crime on the development and the community safety officer had advised that the existing doors were perfectly satisfactory, md there was no demand for this from residents. However as Mr Garton-Jones’ clients have very expensive cars (Ferraris etc) and apparently were not satisfied with the existing security , Mr Garton-Jones led a campaign for this which met with a complete lack of resident interest. After a second intensive campaign, involving door to door canvassing, they managed to get around 20% of households to vote and a majority of those were in favour (unsurprising since they had been given totally one sided information and a highly leading ballot form) The total cost of this work was about £750,000 to date and needless to say all of this had to be paid by residents, 80% approximately of whom had not even voted on the proposal.

The managing agents who conducted the ‘consultation’ and vote on the security ‘upgrades’ (Rendall and Rittner) took a fee of 2% on that £750,000 in addition to the standard annual charge which they make. Rendall and Rittner had a direct financial interest in making these works go ahead and the way in which they conducted the consultation with residents was extremely biased and aimed towards making the works go ahead (the consultation letter said that even of residents voted against it was likely that it would go ahead at a later time!).

Once appointed, residents can only change managing agents with the greatest difficulty. Managing agents are appointed by the Freeholder (Berkeley Homes in this case) on rolling contracts, renewed annually with no consultation with residents, let alome their explicit approval. Karen Ann Grey of Rendall and Rittner has told me that residents may not see or know anything about the contract between Rendall and Rittner and the freeholder (Berkeley Homes). This is a poor system of governance by anyone’s standards – no consultation, no scrutiny, and in effect taxation (through extremely high service charges) without representation. Service charges which have in fact increased at well above inflation every year that Rendall & Rittner have been the managing agents.

Because it is the freeholder who pays the fees of the managing agent (after having collected this money from residents) it is the freeholder to whom the managing agent answers: He who pays the piper calls the tune. At Chelsea bridge Wharf, Berkeley Homes has behaved in the most outrageous manner (e.g. in 2016 opening up storage depots used by heavy and noisy vehicles only a few metres for residents homes). Berkeley Homes did not consult with residents about this nor did they have planning permission. Through resident action, these depots were eventually closed down (after more than 9 months of the most gross disruption to our lives). The managing agent, Rendall and Rittner, refused to give any information to residents about this matter because they are of course controlled by Berkeley Homes. In a further outrageous abuse of its power, and with no consultation with residents or impact assessment, when Berkeley Homes decide to open up a small private service road on the development to general traffic, causing massive noise nuisance around the clock a problem which persists up till now. Rendall and Rittner are unwilling to take any action on this and refuse to even enforce the speed limit on the road. Karen Ann Grey of Rendall and Rittner has acknowledged the problem of speeding on the road but has told me that they cannot do anything about it because Berkeley Homes have insisted that they take no action on the matter. What residents want is of no interest to the managing agent and there is no way for residents to hold the managing agents accountable or to replace them if dissatisfied.

As with many apartment developments in Central London, and elsewhere, many residents are based abroad or travel very frequently for work, so that they are away from their apartment for a significant proportion of the year. Many people are on short term tenancies (as many properties are buy to let and indeed a fair number are being rented on short term / holidays lets e.g.. Air B n B type properties), and it is therefore very hard to get people organised.

The ‘’housing ombudsman’’ is a private company whose subscriptions are paid by the members. This organisation has little interest in genuine scrutiny of managing agents and they are dismissive of complaints. They have no power to enforce any action on the managing agent in any case.

Residents are therefore in essence powerless. They have no meaningful input to what the managing agents (Rendall & Rittner) or the Freeholder (Berkeley Homes) do. There are two residents meetings a year, and about 1 hour in each where residents can ask questions. So that is 2 hours a year in total where residents as a group can directly interact with the managing agents. Actions agreed at meetings are not followed up, the notes are censored to omit any difficult questions or criticism of the managing agents and Rendall & Rittner refuse to supply copies of presentations used at residents’ meetings.

In summary, I suggest that legislation should require:

any major works requires majority of all households (not a majority of those voting)

residents should be provided with a copy of the contract between freeholder and managing agents

residents should have to decide on the renewal of the managing agent’s contract annually or every two years and should be able to trigger a review of the contract at any time if there is a majority of all households in favour of that

5 thoughts on “Protecting consumers in the letting and managing agent market: call for evidence”

Very interesting …… thank you for taking the time and trouble to spell this all out. Of course, we had no idea about the cost of the car park upgrading. Yes, as tenants, we are in a very weak position and have to rely upon landlord integrity. That’s a big hope! What probably acts in our slight favour is that Berkeley Homes have a significant presence on site and will probably not want their reputation totally trashed.
The current issue that is vexing us all is the cladding problem. In fairness to Sonata Akhtar and Karen Gray, who have both worked hard to explain to a lay person like myself, I am finally starting to unscramble all the correspondence. What seems to be happening now is that the unbelievable fire warden costs (apparently running at around £3,500 per DAY – that’s almost £1.3 Million a year) and the heat detector upgrade works are all being paid by Berkeley (and the other landlord possibly?). The contracts are with them. BUT….. they costs are being parked until the government decides who has to bear the costs, so we might still find we end cup with them.
Meanwhile, if you want to rent or sell, this could be a massive problem.
One thing that I, as a total novice, have read is that we pay a voluntary contribution of £10 per half year towards the CBW Right To Manage organisation.
I assume (I know, it makes an ass out of you and me) that this represents the tenants?
Trouble is, I can’t find where they are based, how to contact them and who they really are.
Does anyone know?
I will write again if I find out.
Merry Christmas (no humbugs!).

However we have received absolutely no other information about this. I was not aware of fore wardens or any heat detector upgrade – I am guessing that the wardens issue is limited to those blocks with the cladding – but not sure if heat detector upgrade will be all blocks. The cost of fore wardens seems outrageous – how many are there an what are they doing and how often, i wonder, to justify this cost?

This is indeed worrying – I am not sure what the actual risk is of a fire that is accelerated by the cladding and obviously making sure that does not happen is the first priority. Removing it would seem to be a good idea although I don;t know what the cost implications of that are – it seems that it could hardly be more than the cost of fire wardens if that is to continue,

My main thoughts are for the safety of residents and I am hoping that the risk of an accelerated fore is very low but the only way it can be zero is to remove this cladding, I would have thought.I am sure residents would sleep easier if that was done.

The idea that this massive costs might come to residents is also terrifying and I think residents need to be clearly told by Berkeley Homes that they, as an organisation making half a billion pounds a year costs, and they as the organisation which designed in this cladding, will bear the costs and not the residents.

Regarding the Chelsea bridge wharf resident’ association – to the best of my knowledge this is defunct.I am not aware of any meetings held in the last 2 years, they have no website and offer no phone line or email that I am aware of. Same goes for the right to manage organisation. If membership fees for either of these non-existent bodies have been added to the service charges for non existent services then that would be absolutely scandalous, As far as I am aware that is not the case but I will be checking.

I appreciate these issues would be a massive issue for those wishing to buy or sell in the effected blocks and indeed given the possibility of the costs being added to the service charge then it is potentially a financial time bomb for all current or future residents,

I would not rely at all on Berkeley Homes’ integrity in this matter, but yes I am sure they are keen to avoid bad publicity at their supposed flagship site. I have lived here since Chelsea Bridge Wharf was opened and Berkeley Homes have shown time and time again their complete contempt for residents, their total ignorance of normal procedures for consultation and indeed their contempt for the law (e.g opening up horrendously noisy building depots on Sopwith Way without planning permission, opening up Sopwith Way to general traffic with consultation, refusing to install adequate traffic management on Sopwith Way so that residents are now plagued by 24/7 speeding traffic and boy racers, building an office directly under my flat without consultation..I could go on).

Thanks very much for the information and please stay in touch. If I come across any useful information I will publish it here. Hope there will be a good solution and that Berkeley Homes and Rendall and Rittner will not continue to trample over the residents of Chelsea Bridge Wharf. If they do, then sooner or later the residents will need to make a collective stand.

Hi Vincit,
I’ve just spent 20 minutes replying and lost the bl++dy message!
In brief, I think that actually Berkeley and R&R are doing OK. Whatever way they move someone will complain. I have struggled to get clear information but found by speaking to R&R, they are straight about things. They probably do not want to go into print on anything if possible. The London Fire Brigade (LFB) are now paranoid so they inspected all flats and where they have found any suspicious cladding, they have instructed landlords to alter emergency plans, often including the use of wardens. That’s what’s happened for us. I think there are 11 of them, 24/7. Out of about 1150 flats on CBW, around half are affected. The landlord has no choice. What they can choose though is to put it through the service charges, or not. I have an article from The Times where other landlords are doing that. Berkeley aren’t. The upgrade works for heat sensors is also being paid for by Berkeley. They have signed the contracts. Now, that might change depending on the outcome of the Grenfell investigation, but until that is out, we’re all stuck. I think that what Berkeley are doing is getting the sensors upgraded, then they will go to the LFB and try to agree that wardens are no longer needed. Again, that makes sense. Berkeley don’t want this to cost any more than possible.
What we’re not being told though is how much of this panelling/cladding there really is that is affected. probably because they want to keep it as a low profile issue. In a way that is good for tenants, because we don’t really want a load of publicity, do we?
It’s tricky stuff. Grenfell has changed everything. That terrible tragic event will at least alter the way people treat fire. Removing cladding can actually create many other issues. Just because it was a problem at Grenfell does not totally mean it would be a problem elsewhere. It’s down to design and installation. We are all stuck until the report comes out. Personally, I think the flats are extremely safe. They are very modern, not refurbished, 40 storey, single stairwell, high density. We have to be proportionate.
Thanks for the info (or lack of!) on the Right To Manage organisation. I will let you know as soon as (if) I get a response. It is being charged on the service charge, so I assume it does still exist, somewhere! Again, in fairness to R&R, they made a big point of mentioning it and recommending that we all pay. They could easily have buried that information.
Last point. I think I’m right in saying that the previous management team at CBW was called Peverel? Owned by the Tchenguez brothers? They were booted out for their awful standards of operation and replaced by R&R. You know I mentioned The Times article? Guess who was behind one of the companies putting costs straight into the service charge….a Tchenguez company.
I know, R&R will not be perfect. Berkeley are a tooth and claw capitalist business, but right now I think we could do a lot worse!
Merry Christmas too!

Hi ‘Vincit’, apologies, but I cannot seem to find the blog on cladding – seems to have disappeared?

Just to give you an update. I have contacted R&R over the past few days and had what I felt was a very clear and sensible response which I think I can summarise as follows:

Berkeley are currently funding the costs of the walking wardens, fire stopping and detector/sensor upgrade works. They have the right to charge this back to the tenants/residents, but nothing will happen until the DCLG report on Grenfell comes out. It also does not seem to be total coincidence that there’s a review/consultation paper in play on Managing Agents. That will potentially have an impact.
No Landlord’s going to do anything about the cladding replacement until the report comes out and there’s an expectation that the report might also give direction on who should pay.
As I have said before, while there’s clearly a historical backlog of bad feeling, I am entering as a new person into this and will make my judgements based on the experiences that I have and thus far, having had to do a bit of unscrambling, I now feel that I’m informed.
I have arranged to speak to Mr Garton Jones early in the New Year (the CBW RTM) and intend to act on the same basis – providing that I get clear answers then I feel this has the potential to provide a unified method for the future. If we don’t, it will be much harder to communicate and then we’ll end up with suspicion.
The cladding issue is of a magnitude that is so huge when compared to previous events (even the garage security costs) that I feel we all (landlord, managing agent, tenants) will come out best working together.
As I’ve said before, you clearly have some ongoing poor experience and a far longer time living in CBW, which I haven’t. I can only hope that we might all be able to use this as a ‘hard reset’.

So, once I think that’s as far as I can really comment on these issues via this forum.

You are right that the cladding issue is potentially massive in terms of repercussions for residents and this underlines my previous points about Rendall & Rittner and Berkeley Homes having an extremely unprofessional and undemocratic attitude in terms of sharing information with residents and consulting with them. It is indefensible that residents outside the effected blocks have not been made aware of this. If you do not live in one of the effected blocks you would likely no nothing about this risk of a large charge coming your way 0 would you be happy with that?

We don’t know the outcome of that report but that isn’t the point – we should be told what the current situation is, made aware of the possible outcomes. Apart from that, regardless of the report, Berkeley Homes made the design specification in the first place and they make about £500 million a year profit so there should be no question at all of residents paying for their mistakes.

I agree we need a united front but as I have said several times I cannot have any confidence in Garton-Jones because of the very obvious conflict of interest between his estate agency and the interest of residents – this has already cost residents a small fortune and may well continue to do so as Mr Garton Jones will be taking positions which are in the best interests of his business. In any case as I pointed out the RTM organisation seems to be defunct – no website, no meetings, do not attend meetings between residents and Rendall & Rittner, So ‘hard reset’ is not meaningful to me in this context unless Garton-Jones intends to close his estate agency business and start acting like a ‘normal’ residents’ association. As for Rendall & Rittner – I may have a ‘hard reset ‘ with them when they deal with the traffic issues on Sopwith Way and stop acting in a secretive and defensive manner, and start considering the interests of residents rather than just those of Berkeley Homes and themselves.
I am not asking you to share my views, just explaining to you what they are, and how I come to have them. I will be happy to share with you any information that I come across in relation to this matter and when time allows I will be doing my best to get residents aware of this matter.